Mats get do-over

The cotton growing north of Eagle Field in Acuff wasn’t the only thing looking good Thursday night.

New Deal and Roosevelt held their final preseason scrimmage with both teams showing signs of being district championship competitors, while at the same time showing other things that still must be ironed out before Friday’s season opener.

“I think we’ve got a long way to go, but I saw some good things, too,” New Deal head coach Ron Mayo said. “We’re still trying to experiment with the shotgun, no-huddle type deal and it was pretty rusty, but at times it looked good, too. That type thing can throw you off your rhythm, but if you get good at it, it can throw the defense off its rhythm.”

Roosevelt, meanwhile, was also experimenting — with different quarterbacks. Senior Levi Sherrill, who played receiver last season, had the edge going into two-a-days as the starter after having a good spring. But the emergence of junior Derrick Coppedge in the preseason practices has created some competition.

Coppedge led the Eagles to their only score during the controlled-action portion of the scrimmage, hitting running back Kevin Lamae on swing pass that Lamae took 23 yards for the touchdowns. Then, in the two live quarters portion, Coppedge threw a pair of touchdown passes that ended 12- and 10-play scoring drives that covered a total of 164 yards.

Roosevelt head coach Greg Poynor said after the scrimmage he plans to play both players under center during the non-district portion of the schedule and make a decision from there.

“I do want to make a decision three or four games into the season,” Poynor said. “When we get to district I don’t want to be flipping my quarterback back and forth, but at the same time I want to see them in some real game situations ... see them on Friday nights and make sure they can handle it, and then make a decision later in the season. By the time we get to district, we’ll know who our quarterback is.”

Mayo knows who his quarterback is — but it depends on what formation the Lions (No. 10 South Plains Top 10) are running as to which quarterback is in.

Most times, it will be senior Kyler Bean, and on Thursday the left-hander played well, leading the Lions to their only two offensive scores of the day (Cole Jackson had an interception return for a touchdown). When New Deal goes to the Wildcat offense, most times it will be junior V.J. Gamez running the show, and he showed signs of some big-play capabilities against the Eagles

But it was the running backs that drove New Deal, particularly senior Aaron Mares. He had a nifty 9-yard touchdown run taking an inside handoff in a misdirection formation, then took a pitch around the end during the live quarters for a 2-yard touchdown.

“That’s kind of our deal, running back by committee, receiver by committee. That’s the way we’ve done things,” Mayo said. “But, eventually, there will be someone who steps forward and we will go from there. Without watching film, we did some good things and some things we’re not so pleased with. But I thought we did alright.”

Mats get do-over

With early-evening storms building across northern Lubbock, Estacado and Big Spring tried to start their varsity scrimmage early but were forced off the field by lightning just a few plays into the Matadors’ first offensive set.

It ended up being a good thing, because Estacado (No. 4 South Plains Top 10) was less than focused, and the delay gave the coaching staff a chance to point that out, something that won’t be available when the Matadors open the 2012 season Thursday at Lowrey Field against Hereford.

“I thought when we came out first before the weather break we were not ready,” Estacado coach Danny Servance said. (Big Spring) was high, they were ready to go and they hit us in the mouth a little bit. I think you go through that some with young teams, and you don’t expect to get hit in the mouth like that. We had the opportunity to regroup and come back out like we did, and I think it’s good we had that opportunity ... it ended up working out for our good because we came back out and I thought had the type of intensity we needed to see from the start.”

Once the Matadors got focused, they dominated the Steers both in the controlled-action portion and the lone live quarter between the teams.

Estacado’s defense stymied the Steers, never letting them near the end zone and forcing a punt and a turnover during the live quarter.

Stellar running back Robert Johnson showed he is ready for the season. On the second play after the lightning delay, he took a handoff up the middle, broke to the outside and outraced the Steers 76 yards for his lone touchdown of the day. He also showed the ability to stop on a dime and change directions, and added a 43-yard run on the next-to-last play of the live quarter.

“He ran the ball fairly well tonight,” Servance said. “There’s still some things we think he can do better like getting over and behind his pads and running through tacklers, but he did do a good job.”

Estacado is also searching for a new quarterback with four candidates going into the game. Senior Zach Garcia and junior Roderick Hall got the bulk of the work and both played well, with Hall scoring on a couple of keepers.

““I’ll sit down with coach (Rodney) Sims and talk after we evaluate film,” Servance said. “Usually when you look at it with the naked eye, there’s mistakes you don’t see that once we go through the film, we’ll see if it’s as good as we think it is. I think we’re still quarterback by committee right now.”